I think they could assuage a lot of the criticism if they could explain, coherently and in full detail, what happens when someone or a team generates revenue in excess of $100,000.

Saying you have to buy a (perpetual) license is easily understandable. Pay for the license and you have satisfied the conditions.

But saying you have to buy a subscription is so totally open ended. For how long? If someone or a team makes $100k+ one year but doesn't in year 2, year 3, etc... do they pay for a years worth of subscription? Or do they have to pay for 2? 3? 10? 15?

It doesn't change the idea that we firmly believe that this opens the door for new open source engines to gain market share and will take away from Unity's market share, but they could lessen the amount of bleeding that is going to occur by clarifying how this would work in these types of scenarios.

I can tell you that I don't judge a game solely based on the logo but there is more than enough evidence to lead me to believe that some people will judge the game based on the logo. Normally I would write them off as someone who would simply nitpick the game regardless of the logo, but the problem isn't so much those that don't buy the game as those who don't buy it and leave an unfairly negative review.

I may not judge the game based on its logo but if a game has enough negative reviews then I will steer clear of it.

If I saw a really impressive trailer with a bandicam stamp on it, I would think that this is a really good trailer that just happens to be made by someone who is just starting out!

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How many really impressive trailers have you seen with a bandicam stamp though? I'm willing to believe that there may be someone out there, most likely a kid who doesn't have permission to buy a registered copy, has made a game and now wants to create a trailer to distribute.

But if you can't even afford the $39 cost for a registered copy of Bandicam what are the chances you can afford the assets to create a good game. There may be some out there who can create the majority of it themselves, use creative commons assets, or just do a good job without good assets, but I can't imagine there will be many like that.

The mentioned article may or may not be sponsored.
" Laura Kate Dale was on a press trip to Unite 2015 with other journalists. Her travel and accommodation costs were met by Unity."

There are some remarks -There is an acknowledged negative perception of Unity logo, Unity logo on bad products hurts Unity, good products made with Unity do not bear Unity logo, might see some action. Use of unmodified complete projects from asset store on steam hurts publishers and steam, no action planned on this front.

But if you can't even afford the $39 cost for a registered copy of Bandicam what are the chances you can afford the assets to create a good game.

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True...but that doesn't mean I dismiss them before I watch the trailer. The above person said they don't even play a game with with the Unity logo. It is that attitude that makes me think our community is not as great as we think. Of course, a lot of these people were not involved until the price hike. lol So maybe our community is fine.

Honestly, UT should just swallow their pride and adopt the Unreal pricing model, or something similar. It's a far more fair and organic solution.

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Yep. Some people don't like it, but you are absolutely right. Its not great for any one side, its not horrible for any one side, but its the *fair* option - if you make any money give a portion of what you make back to support the team that made it possible in the first place. I haven't seen anyone admitting that though. Thanks for making the point.

Another thing is that also already announced Plus to also have one month subscribes so that would allow people to sub few times a year only to release updates without splash (includes possible pro downgraders).

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This could be remedied a number of ways. One being no splash screen for a 1 year commitment, semi custom splash screen for a month to month, you would already pay a higher rate for month-to-month anyway.

Or remove the monthly option and require a minimum commitment, 6mon, 1yr, whatever.

Yep. Some people don't like it, but you are absolutely right. Its not great for any one side, its not horrible for any one side, but its the *fair* option - if you make any money give a portion of what you make back to support the team that made it possible in the first place. I haven't seen anyone admitting that though. Thanks for making the point.

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So why is the current option not fair then? You have to pay only if you make money. By that you give Unity back but in the long run the costs are more predictable.
That's not a thing of "admitting" to it. It's not fairer it's different.
The people who earn enough money have to pay just as the people who do not make money do not have to pay.

A thing that is unfair by this logic, though, is for universities and schools. Those have a definitive turnover of more than 100k but still often don't have the budget to buy for Pro subscriptions. There it really is unfair and I know of at least one school that currently can't teach Unity any more because of that.
I don't see that applying as much to the free market, though.

You know how Steam recently released a new controller and a lot of developers updated their old games to better support it?

Let's say a team of five people made a game. Years later it's not gaining revenue but it still has a loyal fan base. The team wants to provide some minor bug fixes and add some UI graphics for Steam Controller.

They already spent $7,500 to remove the splash screen, now they need to spend at least $1,500 more to keep it removed. $1,500 for an hour or two of use, justified with inclusion of a bunch of services that'll go unused.

There could be compatibility issues with recent external plugins and hardware. For example, the latest releases of the Facebook plugin requires Unity 5. You still can use an older version with 4, but you lose features, and it is not guaranteed that Facebook will support it. Not always, but sometimes an upgrade is a requirement.

A "loyal fan base" is loyal, but is still a customer base. Placing the splash screen on a two year old game (for example) requires a lot of explanation to them, otherwise it will be seen as a regression, a lack of quality and professionalism. Just because they are loyal, doesn't mean they will like, or even understand, everything.

There could be compatibility issues with recent external plugins and hardware. For example, the latest releases of the Facebook plugin requires Unity 5. You still can use an older version with 4, but you lose features, and it is not guaranteed that Facebook will support it. Not always, but sometimes an upgrade is a requirement.

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But this would require an update to the game by itself.

If it really is just about fixing a few bugs and adding a "Steam-Controller" UI it actually would be advisable to use the old "stable" Unity version instead of buying a new one.
An engine update could introduce bugs and incompatibilities with the code and assets and is therefore far more critical then just using the old Unity version.
So if you are going to release a game you probably want to own Unity. This makes the new pay2own option very valuable.

If it really is just about fixing a few bugs and adding a "Steam-Controller" UI it actually would be advisable to use the old "stable" Unity version instead of buying a new one.
An engine update could introduce bugs and incompatibilities with the code and assets and is therefore far more critical then just using the old Unity version.
So if you are going to release a game you probably want to own Unity. This makes the new pay2own option very valuable.

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you've obviously never had to update a Unity3 written game on IOS where Xcode has become incompatible as has the need to be 64 bit. Basically U3 is now almost impossible to re release games onto IOS, U4 can still be done but there are a few hacks that have to be made. As time passes U4 will become harder and harder to release stuff for.

The various targets force you over time to keep updating your version of Unity and this is what UT rely on to force us to keep paying.

But still, updating a complex project to a new Unity major version (or however major changes in the engine are handled in future) can be laborious anyway, so updating the engine licence is only a part of the cost.

Also it is fair and necessary to pay for a maintained product. If this is done via a subscription or a paid upgrade every other year does not really matter (if the last version is still owned afterwards).
What matters is that the new subscription plan seems to be far more costly (up to 5 times as much) in almost every case than the former system (unless you are already on subscription with at least one additonal mobile licence).

Any paid plan should be able to remove the MWU screen; we should not have to pay and advertise Unity. Simple.

I see no value for myself in the Plus plan right now. And how is charging for a change in UI color justified? Unity should see it as a basic, stock-standard accessibility feature and add it to all plans).

At the moment, I give Unity zero dollars. As the Plus plan cannot remove the MWU splash screen, I will not subscribe to the plan, and therefore Unity continue to get zero dollars from me. This may hurt the perception of my game but, like many, I'm not yet in a position to pony up $125 a month (more for us Aussies) and certainly won't pay $35 a month to advertise Unity with the MWU screen. So what they're trying to achieve with the Plus plan seems like a false economy.

Don't get me wrong - I'm a fan of the platform and find developing with Unity quick and easy. I'd be more than happy to pay for the Plus plan if I could have no MWU screen.

You would think, if anything, Unity would want their logo hidden in the default instance, to save them from the current perception that it's an amateur platform that churns out crappy games. Epic don't let the Unreal logo be shown on anything but the best - so you know when you see the Unreal logo, you're getting a quality title. Unity has done the opposite.

A couple of ideas (off the top of my head, I haven't thought about these TOO deeply, so there are likely flaws!):

Link the requirement to have the MWU to revenue -- for example, if your game earns less than X dollars, you don't have to pay to remove the MWU screen.

Give devs an incentive to show the MWU -- for example, if you show MWU, you'll get X% off your sub fee.

Just remove the MWU screen entirely and only let the really quality titles add it

Sure, if they paid $15,000 instead of $7,500 to begin with. The $7,500 would end the subscription after one year, and UT doesn't let you keep the license until after two (or was it three? I don't think UT clarified it, so maybe that's actually $22,500)

First, it does. Second, that's irrelevant. Once you've paid $7,500 for a "feature" to remove the screen, it's paid for and should be allowed. You shouldn't need to pay any amount again to remove the screen, or have to justify why you want to.

Any paid plan should be able to remove the MWU screen; we should not have to pay and advertise Unity. Simple.

I see no value for myself in the Plus plan right now. And how is charging for a change in UI color justified? Unity should see it as a basic, stock-standard accessibility feature and add it to all plans).

At the moment, I give Unity zero dollars. As the Plus plan cannot remove the MWU splash screen, I will not subscribe to the plan, and therefore Unity continue to get zero dollars from me. This may hurt the perception of my game but, like many, I'm not yet in a position to pony up $125 a month (more for us Aussies) and certainly won't pay $35 a month to advertise Unity with the MWU screen. So what they're trying to achieve with the Plus plan seems like a false economy.

Don't get me wrong - I'm a fan of the platform and find developing with Unity quick and easy. I'd be more than happy to pay for the Plus plan if I could have no MWU screen.

You would think, if anything, Unity would want their logo hidden in the default instance, to save them from the current perception that it's an amateur platform that churns out crappy games. Epic don't let the Unreal logo be shown on anything but the best - so you know when you see the Unreal logo, you're getting a quality title. Unity has done the opposite.

A couple of ideas (off the top of my head, I haven't thought about these TOO deeply, so there are likely flaws!):

Link the requirement to have the MWU to revenue -- for example, if your game earns less than X dollars, you don't have to pay to remove the MWU screen.

Give devs an incentive to show the MWU -- for example, if you show MWU, you'll get X% off your sub fee.

Just remove the MWU screen entirely and only let the really quality titles add it

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I think all of this is spot on, but I want to reiterate that UT needs to entice the market Plus is aimed at to actually buy it for something they want to pay for. If the splash removal is added to Plus as it is now, a lot of people will jump on it but feel like they're just paying $35/mo for the splash because they don't necessarily need the other services Plus is providing. We all like the engine (to varied extents), I and others want to support it's development financially as well. But UT is a for-profit company, not a charity. Since the engine is free, I want to pay for something useful, not get bogged down on what should be minor points of splash and gray interfaces.

More then you think... Even the default resolution/key layout popup is a dead giveaway when a game is Unity made. The negative impression is frankly easy to spot. People instantly assume a UE4 game will be better made because its not a "hobby" game engine. Because big companies use it for there development. Unity on the other hand, with a lot of those quick cash grabbing games, has a bit of a reputation. There are good games out there made in unity but the whole asset store dump games, really hurt the reputation.

Frankly, i did not even notice the price / model change ( proposal ) until today. And it kind of worries me... I remember tools like PHPStorm where you used to buy a licence for a period ( or where able to by a infinite licence ). But you still needed to "upgrade" for every year with the normal licence. Guess when the new versions came out Now they even moved to a subscription based model, what is just way more expensive in the long run ( think it resulted in almost doubling the price ) and that is only after a LOT of negative feedback from the community.

Its a major turnoff when companies change there plans like that.

Now what i read from Unity, its PHPStorm all over again. Its a open door for in the future to allow more "tweaking" on the licences. Development tools are items you use for years. But a game engine is something that needs support for 5 years or more. Maybe a year or two game development, beta period, release, expansions, bug fixing, ... maybe a successor game based upon the same code base.

Lets say we release a game. Its stable 1.0 version and we have no plans for expansions etc... O wait ... some people report bugs with x new hardware or undocumented bugs. Now, if the bugs is in Unity, that means we need to upgrade to a newer version. But ... that also means we need to keep paying the licence despite that maybe no more development is being done! Oeps ... Downgrading to personal licence means those bugs may be foxed & compile the game but then there comes the splash screen.

A payment model like this will only enhance the desire of developers to drop all support after a release and simply cut any financial bleeding ( if they do not plan any more development at that time ).

Its a massive difference between a development tool like PHPStorm, where you can simply edit files manually or use a other editor versus a game engine like Unity, where you are stuck to the engine for your entire project!

And frankly, while this may be cheaper for iOS developers, i do not care for iOS. Most developers are probably desktop developers? Seeing the price going up like this and with the potential "rearranging prices" in the future again. Remember, promises mean nothing. Stuff writing in FAQ files all the time get conveniently removed or forgotten.

At this moment i am wondering ( as i am only a few months into development ) if i am better sticking it out or just trying out UE4 what may be more expensive in the future but it does not look like they will alter there business model any time soon. Disadvantage is also... there go all the assets from the store ( beyond some things that can be recovered like textures etc ).

We shall see in a short while when Unity they release there final licence changes but lets just say that stuff like this always leaves a bad taste in the community there mouths.

I will trow this... if unity logo have bad reputation because it is used in vrappy games... well, what about the free version dont have the logo and if it is a good game, show off the logo like almost all major games out there that put on their startup screen achieved with cryengine or made with unreal engine... .

So only good games made with unity will have the logo (even you need to pay to show the unity logo !!!!!! crazy isnt??? xD).... and tada... (no more bad branding to the mark, fixed!)

At this moment i am wondering ( as i am only a few months into development ) if i am better sticking it out or just trying out UE4 what may be more expensive in the future but it does not look like they will alter there business model any time soon. Disadvantage is also... there go all the assets from the store ( beyond some things that can be recovered like textures etc ).

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It doesn't feel good but sunk costs shouldn't hold you back from making the best decision for the future (http://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/sunk-cost-trap.asp). The worst of it is, most of the money I've spent on the Asset Store has been for features that are already built into UE4

Seriously? The coming months? I guess that I am a little frustrated at being dropped into limbo waiting to find out what UT has decided. I am a current Pro subscriber would like to know something sooner than a couple of months now. My subscription and my current project are coming to an end. I know that I will either going with Plus or switch to another engine because I don't like the new Pro plan.

It doesn't feel good but sunk costs shouldn't hold you back from making the best decision for the future (http://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/sunk-cost-trap.asp). The worst of it is, most of the money I've spent on the Asset Store has been for features that are already built into UE4

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Yea, that is always a problem. Tonight some analyzing UE4 and frankly, it just looks more professional ( thank you Black Theme ). The Blueprint system is nice, just takes some getting used too. I especially like that from 4.11/4.12 ( just released ) that Blueprints can compile to native C++ code.

That is something i did wonder about with Unity, if the C# actually compiles down to machine code or still was running into a VM layer. Notice a bunch of nice ( other ) features. Anyway, Unity development is on hold while trying out UE4.

Seriously? The coming months? I guess that I am a little frustrated at being dropped into limbo waiting to find out what UT has decided. I am a current Pro subscriber would like to know something sooner than a couple of months now. My subscription and my current project are coming to an end. I know that I will either going with Plus or switch to another engine because I don't like the new Pro plan.

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No kidding ... It seems to me that they made the plans to change to the subscription model and are now unsure what to do themselves. Probably because of the negative feedback. You do wonder if people live in bubbles because a negative response like this was frankly easy to predict. Or are they simply pulling the: "We make it seem really bad, give some small concessions and let the customers think they won".

Same here... i cant even answer post or answers in their forums or answers xD... lol... it seems that it runs on prett specific spects (even that I have a titan somewhere.... it doesnt run there too ).

Maybe that is why they where going banckrup the year a go... if it wasnt by amazon that later made free available their own specific version https://aws.amazon.com/lumberyard/ I think all of them will be gone by now (they are terrible I think, hope they make it good enought to even run on the systems that it can't run)... so we can have a complete C++ and C# engine with full source for $0 USD ... as just one extra tool.

Yea, that is always a problem. Tonight some analyzing UE4 and frankly, it just looks more professional ( thank you Black Theme ). The Blueprint system is nice, just takes some getting used too. I especially like that from 4.11/4.12 ( just released ) that Blueprints can compile to native C++ code.

That is something i did wonder about with Unity, if the C# actually compiles down to machine code or still was running into a VM layer. Notice a bunch of nice ( other ) features. Anyway, Unity development is on hold while trying out UE4.

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"Tonight" "some analyzing" "looks more professional" ... so you basically wanted to confirm that everybody tells you UE is better per se by a little checking out the dark UI and looks of more professialism (whatever that is)?
What can you really tell about whether Unreal is better by a a few days?
What were your first few day impressions of unity?

If you want to change - do it. But do it for the right reasons. Not because of image. You cannot judge an engine in a few days until you're really worked on a project with it.

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